 The Road to Yuba City
A journey into the Juan Corona murders.
Tracy Kidder
Five Stars*
*it takes a chapter or two to warm up.
 The author lived as a drifter while researching his first book about the Juan Corona migrant murders in Northern California. Tracy Kidder's second book, The Soul of a New Machine, won the Pulitzer Prize, and he promptly bought back the rights to prevent Doubleday from reprinting this first book. There are still copies floating around, and it's worth the wait.
Kidder takes us on a mesmerizing journey into a transient's world, once a common though marginal way of life. Migrant workers and railroad-riding tramps stand in line nd wait for a pickup to roll by. "Wanna work?"
Juan Corona drove that truck, and employed many men in his California farm labor camps. Men live in shantytowns among the trees, foraging for food and eating meat provided by their boss. Speaking only Spanish, they rely on a local boss to translate their willingness to work into American money. Owners also hired dayworkers, often tramps who drifted through town on the railroads.
"He left me at his labor camp, a couple of old wood and screen buildings set among peach trees and full of dirt and broken bed springs. One building housed a kitchen, containing an old icebox and a stove without an overn door. But the floor was swept and cans hand-labeled SUGAR and SALT and PEPPER stood on a shelf."
In the 70's bodies were found buried on the flood plains of the Feather and Yuba rivers. In the spring the rivers crest their shores and flood the riverbottoms with silty mountain runoff. When the waters recede, grave-sized rectangular depressions began to appear. They contained the bodies of transient men. Many were well-known souls who had drifted peacefully around California for years.
Juan Corona was convicted for the grisly murders, based on meat receipts found in a grave. Defense lawyers made an excellent case for
In prison three fellow inmates stabbed Juan Corona 32 times with a razor, destroying one eye. He continues to plead his innocence behind bars.
This book will leave you with a haunting doubt about the identity of
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